7 comments:

It is indeed interesting that pot C would still be possible, because that is what the France coach Dominech complained about, and which was the reason UEFA reworked the system in the first place. Anyway, I think the new system is indeed somewhat fairer, although I still wonder how the 'constants' were chosen. Why 38000 for a World Cup final, and 500 per goal, etc.?

Thank you for the informative blog!Despite UEFA's new ranking system, the main problem of high chances for imbalanced groups remains, unless the hosts automatic seeding in pot1 together with defending champions and best qualifier is abolished. No problem with seeding them with home advantage in pot 2, 3 or even 4, but unless Poland and Ukraine at least get to semifinals at EURO 2008 or FIFA 2010, we will continue to have worries about teams and their motivation to become best qualifier (i.e. to avoid heading the "group of death")! A team should always be rewarded for winning a match.

For EURO 2008 a balanced pot structure before draw would have been: Pot1 (2004/06 finalists)- Greece, Portugal, France, Italy Pot2 (2004/06 semifinalists+1)- Germany, Czech Rep, Netherlands, Spain Pot3 (2004/06 qualified)- Sweden, Croatia, Poland, RussiaPot4 (2 hosts+remaining2)- Austria, Switzerland, Romania, TurkeyPerceived imbalanced group of course still possible, but more unlikely.Anyway, priority must have a change to the tournament format - group runner up and group winner should never meet before the final in a tournament of 2^x participants. Hopefully this mistake of excluding a priori many possible finals will not be repeated in FIFA 2010 or EURO 2012.

Being seeded is one of the perks of being host. As far as I know, all major tournaments (World Cup, EURO, African Cup of Nations, Copa America, Asian Cup) use this system. I don't think UEFA will cease using it anytime soon.

As for the tournament format, it was changed to equalize rest periods after many teams complained about it at EURO 2004. See here.

I´m sure anyone can see that beeng "seeded" in pot1 is not actually beeing seeded. With this system pot2 will always be the best pot and what we can call the "high rank pot" instead of seeded pot. A group of death will almost always occur. The solution that i want to see in future European championships is a 32 team tournament! In that case pot1 will be both the "seeded pot" and the "high rank pot" and a group of death will never occur.Only positve things about a 32 team EURO Ch.+bigger tournament+same format as FIFA WC+Involving more counties+less qualification games (the clubteams would like that too)

* The number of countries able to host the final tournament would drop considerably. Even with two hosts.* There are 53 UEFA members. A final tournament with 32 members would involve more than half of them. Why not have a tournament with 53 teams then? :)

Hi Edgar.Yes your first point i can agree is a negative one.But your second point i thing is a positive one. 32 is a good format. 53 really is not. The point is i think less qualifications in europe is positive.I just want to see a EC with all so called "good" teams and all so called "almost good" teams. That´s it, i want them all in the same tournament. I think the championship would be much more interresting that way.But that´s just my opinion. I know that most people probably disagree.